Chapter 7 - America’s Most Wanted
Nathaniel surrendered.
I screamed at him not to.
My mother begged him to reconsider.
Gideon offered to fight our way out through the drainage tunnel.
Nathaniel refused them all.
“If we run,” he said, “Victor controls the story. If I stay, he controls the evidence. I need him to believe he has won.”
The police placed Nathaniel on his knees outside the facility.
News helicopters circled above us.
Cameras recorded as officers handcuffed the richest and most feared man in America.
Victor’s plan worked perfectly.
By noon, Nathaniel’s face appeared on every television screen.
Authorities accused him of operating the private prison, trafficking human beings through Graves shipping routes, murdering witnesses, and kidnapping Claire, Michael, and me.
Even our rescue became evidence against him.
Michael was taken to a hospital under federal protection.
My mother and I were moved to a government safe house.
Dr. Mercer survived the gunshot wound, but federal agents detained her for falsifying my birth records.
Gideon vanished before the police could arrest him.
For two days, I watched strangers on television describe Nathaniel as a monster.
Some of their stories were true.
He had threatened people.
He had bribed officials.
He had controlled judges and ordered violent men to do violent things.
But he had not killed Evelyn.
He had not imprisoned my father.
He had protected me in the lobby.
He had surrendered so we could escape.
“Good people don’t do bad things,” I said.
My mother sat beside me on the safe house couch.
“Sometimes they do.”
“Then they’re bad.”
“Sometimes bad people do good things too.”
“That makes no sense.”
“No,” she said. “It doesn’t.”
My father was brought to the safe house after doctors released him.
He walked with a cane and tired easily.
The first night, he sat beside my bed and told me about the years before I was born.
He had loved my mother since the day she spilled coffee across his accounting reports.
He had loved Evelyn like a sister.
He had never trusted Victor.
“Why didn’t Nathaniel believe you?” I asked.
“Victor understood Nathaniel’s greatest weakness.”
“What was it?”
“Loyalty.”
I frowned.
“That sounds like a good thing.”
“It is, until you give it to someone who does not deserve it.”
Michael explained that Victor had spent years making Nathaniel dependent on him. Whenever there was danger, Victor appeared loyal. Whenever there was betrayal, Victor provided a suspect.
“He created the fires,” my father said, “then became the man carrying the water.”
Nathaniel’s trial was scheduled to begin within weeks.
The prosecutors had thousands of documents bearing his signature.
Most were real.
Victor had placed illegal transactions inside legitimate corporate reports, knowing Nathaniel rarely examined the details himself.
“Can you prove Victor did it?” my mother asked.
Michael looked down.
“I created the encryption system. I can enter the financial network, but I need the original access key.”
“Where is it?”
“Inside Graves Tower.”
The building was under Victor’s control.
My father drew the structure from memory.
The main servers were located beneath the executive garage. But the access key was kept inside Nathaniel’s private vault.
“We can’t enter the tower,” Claire said.
“I can,” I answered.
Both of my parents turned toward me.
“I’ve already been there.”
“You were almost killed there,” my mother replied.
“Ms. Voss is dead. Caleb thinks I’m locked in a safe house.”
“You are locked in a safe house.”
I looked toward the federal agent standing outside our door.
“Then why is that man wearing Victor’s ring?”
My father followed my gaze.
The agent’s hand rested near his belt.
On his finger was a gold ring marked with the letter H.
My mother’s face changed.
The agent realized we had noticed.
He reached for his gun.
Michael swung his cane into the man’s knee.
My mother grabbed me and pulled me behind the couch.
The agent fired into the ceiling.
My father tackled him, but eleven years of imprisonment had weakened him.
The man struck Michael across the face and aimed at his chest.
A bullet shattered the window.
The agent fell.
Gideon climbed through the broken glass holding a rifle.
“Government protection is not what it used to be.”
My mother stared at him.
“How did you find us?”
“I followed the men who were following you.”
He handed my father a phone.
“Nathaniel called from federal detention.”
My father placed it on speaker.
Nathaniel’s voice sounded rough.
“Victor is moving the network tonight.”
“To where?” Michael asked.
“An offshore server. Once it leaves the country, the evidence disappears.”
“We need the key from your vault.”
“I know.”
There was a pause.
“The key is not in the vault.”
Michael frowned.
“Where is it?”
Nathaniel spoke slowly.
“Evelyn gave it to Claire the night before she died.”
My mother shook her head.
“She never gave me a key.”
“She gave you something. A pink envelope.”
My mother looked toward me.
The photograph from twelve years earlier had shown her holding a pink envelope.
“I burned it,” she said. “I thought it contained the documents Victor was searching for.”
“Was there anything else inside?”
My mother closed her eyes, remembering.
“A paper doll Evelyn made for Ruby.”
“Where is it?”
“I kept it.”
She ran toward the bedroom and opened the only suitcase we had left.
From beneath a stack of clothes, she removed an old paper doll protected inside a plastic sleeve.
Its dress was pink.
My father examined it.
Tiny numbers had been printed along the folded edges.
“The key,” he whispered.
Gideon looked at his watch.
“We have less than six hours.”
My mother gripped the paper doll.
“How do we reach the network without the tower?”
Michael looked toward the dead agent on the floor.
“We don’t.”
May you like
He removed the man’s access badge.
“We walk straight through the front door.”
